Tendermint Acquisition Takes Aim at New Interoperable DEX for Cosmos

Tendermint enters the decentralized exchange arena with the ambitious goal of creating a one-stop DEX for trading any and all coins.

AccessTimeIconApr 7, 2021 at 3:01 p.m. UTC
Updated Sep 14, 2021 at 12:37 p.m. UTC
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Tendermint, the team behind the interoperable blockchain ecosystem Cosmos, is building out a decentralized exchange (DEX) with a new acquisition.

The development studio has acquired B-Harvest, a decentralized finance project that has developed on Cosmos since the early days and which runs one of Cosmos’ validator nodes. Tendermint would not disclose all the details and dollar amount behind the acquisition, but it includes a four-year vesting of ATOM tokens.

Tendermint will integrate B-Harvest’s Gravity DEX into Cosmos to facilitate “trustless and permissionless” trades, Tendermint’s CEO Peng Zhong told CoinDesk.

“We started working with B-Harvest in October because we were looking for a team with experience in finance and DeFi to create a decentralized exchange. With the Gravity DEX, it’s designed not just to be a native exchange for ATOM, but an exchange for tokens that use other blockchains, as well,” Zhong said.

One of the more ambitious crypto projects, Cosmos is a network hub that connects other blockchains using “bridges.” The network supports both public and private blockchains with the ultimate goal of creating a nexus where all these different blockchains and coins can interact.

Zhong said the Ethereum bridge is in testnet and could be live as soon as the DEX launches, while bridges for Bitcoin and other chains would come later. As with Uniswap and other decentralized markets, anyone with the technical savvy will be able to write a contract for the Cosmos blockchain to integrate a coin or trading pair, Zhong said.

Tendermint estimates Gravity DEX will be live in June or shortly after, depending on the outcomes of a $200,000 Gravity DEX testnet competition.

Updated April 8, 2021, 16:34 UTC: This article was updated to clarify the estimated launch date of the Gravity DEX.

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